JOIN US for the South FIRST FRIDAYS Art Walk + 9th Annual SubZERO Festival on JUNE 3rd & 4th from 6pm ’til Midnight. RSVP

The South FIRST FRIDAYS art walk is a self-guided, nighttime tour through galleries, museums, and independent creative businesses featuring eclectic art exhibitions and special performances.

All Art Walk venues & SubZERO Festival are FREE & open to the public.

NEW EXHIBITS…

•  Art Ark Gallery – 1035 South Sixth St. map

  

  Opening Reception: Wildlife Beyond Borders, From Beauty to Deeper Understanding

  Wildlife Beyond Borders, a photographic exhibit by nine artists showing their passion for protecting the world’s animals, will open with over 100 images. 

  The images show animals in their natural state. The nine artists have spent years photographing animals in many parts of the world to express their deep conviction that animals need to be protected against the onslaught of human activity. The animals are in danger. The images in the exhibition are not only great photographs but also communicate that we need to act to protect them.

  Unless we act, many of these animals will cease to exist and our children, or our children’s children, will never experience the awe of seeing an elephant in the forest or a crane in migration. By portraying horses, polar bears, harp seals, swans, songbirds, African cats, sharks, other marine animals and more, Wildlife Beyond Borders seeks to use the images to encourage us all to act.

  The exhibit started September 2015 at the PhotoCentral Gallery in Hayward, has since traveled to Palo Alto, and been seen by over 3,000 people. A set of new images will be on display at the Art Ark Gallery, showing never seen before: fish eagles, chimpanzees, an underwater mix of “wildlife and landscape”, one of the 15 remaining species of cranes in the world, dreamscape scenes with horses, and the bond between humans and Indian elephants.

  The exhibit has an audio/video feature, known as augmented reality. The viewer points their smartphone at an image and hears the artist deliver a message about their work, their passion, and how they felt when they photographed their subjects. This feature is free to all visitors.

  All images are for sale with a portion of the proceeds benefiting various organizations protecting wildlife.

  Participating Artists: Oliver Klink, curator (Los Gatos), Susan Carnahan (Menlo Park), Mary Aiu (Fairfield), Mike Miller (Portola Valley), Marian Davidson (Portola Valley), Wendy Hannum (San Rafael), Robin V. Robinson (Carmel), Bruce Finocchio (Castro Valley), Jim Codington (Sonoma)

  Oliver Klink, Wildlife Beyond Borders Curator

• MACLA Movimiento de Arte y Cultura Latino Americana – 510 South First St. map

  
  Lady Pink, Train Bomber, 1993.

  Opening Reception: “Code Mixing: From Concrete to Canvas”

  Guest curated by Alice Mizrachi, Code Mixing presents the work of latina street artists at the intersection of art, politics, and gender.

  Featuring work by Mitsy Ávila Águila, Nanibah Chacon, Lady Pink, Leslie “DIME” Lopez and Jessica Sabogal.

  

  La Mixta Criolla is a music and dance ensemble rooted in Puerto Rico’s rich musical culture, inspired by the soulfulness of Caribbean music sure to the delight of all dancers and music lovers. Come listen to their repertoire of original, funky renditions of traditional tunes, featuring a variety of swinging Caribbean grooves, from plena, bomba, guaracha jíbara, aguinaldo, to merengue, son, rumba, seis, cumbia and salsa.

• Works San Jose – 365 South Market St. map

  
  Artwork by Victoria Welling

  Opening Reception: “Deep at the Surface”

  Artists Elvira M. Dayel, Sharon Kyle Kuhn, and Victoria Welling construct an invented, fragmented, and reassembled environment. The artists explore the balance and unavoidable conflicts between beauty and repulsion, chaos and order, and the never ending battle to resolve shifting urban realities.

  Elvira Dayel explores personal interpretations of reality. New constructs become a vital part of nature, offering a resolution to our struggle to obtain balance in our built environment. Abstracted and delineated shapes depict new landscapes we might all fit into.

  Sharon Kyle Kuhn turns the chaos of fragmented pieces of construction debris into orderly compositions that tightly hold together. She explores the small details of urban life that most people would describe as ‘ugly’ or often overlook as irregular pieces of industrial materials.

  Victoria Welling explores relationships with nature while stimulating sensory responses with materials, texture, and composition. The result is a body of work that leads the viewer down a path toward sensory overload with a delicate yet bold dialogue between beauty and repulsion.

• Caffé Frascati – 315 South First St. map

  First Fridays is Caffe Frascati Opera Night presented by First Street Singers, with the Bay Area’s finest opera singers performing your very favorite classical arias and duets live in the cafe! In addition to opera night, we have two new exhibitions opening during April’s South FIRST FRIDAYS Art Walk.

  

  Professional opera singers in a casual cafe setting. In honor of Pride Month, this opera night will be full of women’s arias performed by men and men’s arias performed by women! Anyone can sing love songs about anyone!

  

  Downstairs Gallery Artist Amanda Quental

  There are certain places and things that people avoid or don’t pay much attention to, which I came to realize thru socializing and people watching. Whether they dislike the emotional aspect of what they may feel in these places or they simply think they are ugly, I have spent the last several years traveling around California and more specifically the Bay Area exploring some of these places.

  A common place I have noticed people avoid as much as possible were the cemeteries, only visiting when a friend or family member was getting buried or for a special holiday. As I walk through several different locations I noticed that among the headstones and mausoleums that were erected in memory of an individual there was a sense of peace and tranquility as well as considerable beauty to be found.

  My printing process, through trials and errors, was developed within the last few years. After years of printing traditional black and white, while there was a love for the process, something was amiss. It wasn’t until I began looking into alternative processing that I stumbled upon this method after observing fellow photographers. Now I take time for each print to chemically and carefully alter-making every single one unique and one of a kind. No two images will ever have the same chemical pattern develop which makes the imperfection unique.

  It is through this development process and the haunting locations I photograph in, that create very surreal and captivating images. I want to take things that people don’t pay attention to and show that they can be beautiful. I hope that viewers take with them a sense of beauty and tranquility that can be found on every city big or small.

  

  Upstairs Gallery Artist Tamara Chang

  Tamara Chang is an illustrator based in San Jose, CA. Tamara’s series, “Baby Canines,” is inspired by Psalm 58:6, which asks God to remove the ability to do evil from one’s enemies–to break their teeth and tear out their fangs. She is continuing to explore this concept in both painting and printmaking mediums.

  

  Upstairs Gallery: Ink paintings by Jose Eduardo Castro

  “I don’t envision a very long life… I’ve designed it that way.”

  Townes Van Zandt did not request any sympathy, or desire to be rescued in his slow suicide. He designed it that way, revealing an awareness of a voluntary self-destructive lifestyle: the consequence from the absence of a sanctuary.

  Van Zandt’s words compose these frame ink paintings. Each word is illegible because it was written on stationary spinning at the frequency of a vinyl record, 33 revolutions per minute. The combination of text on spinning paper, results in chaotic lines that have no fidelity to organized linguistic structure. Instead, the distorted words read the turns of his life, here embalmed in modest pine.

  Van Zandt embraced his own mortality, awaiting sanctuary in death. His songs captured the blues of exaggerated truths. Mere words, strung across chords, the hymns tailored to the weight of my shoulders. His records are the relics of a canonized bohemian who I fortunately discovered.

• Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library – 150 E San Fernando St. map

  

  “Organic Constitutions” by Benjamin Martinez

  Inspired by the relationship between organic life and the analog structure of science — Benjamin Martinez explores the symbolism and stories hidden in anatomy and geometry.

• Social Policy – 200 South First St. map

  
  Photo by Marcela Pardo Ariza

  Opening Reception: “Yaocihuatl: Warrior Womxn/Latina Photographers”
  All-Latina photographers show will feature works by Eliana Cetto, Marisol Picazo, Mayrra Guadalupe Lopez, Marcela Pardo Ariza

  Don’t miss Eliana Cetto’s performance piece Friday June 3rd at 8:30 pm

• Studio Climbing Gym – 396 South First St. map

  
  

  Opening reception: “Climbers of Geyikbayiri” by Derron Yuhara

  Description: A series of photographs depicting the unique forms of the limestone landscape in southern Turkey and the climbers that developed and created the community that is Geyikbayiri.

• TechShop San Jose – 300 South Second St. map

  

  START a TechShop Artist Residence Retrospective from 2012 onward.

  A retrospective of the TechShop San Jose Artist in Residency program. Featuring works from the San Jose artist in residence program, past and present.

  The TechShop Artist in Residence program has been running since 2012, one year after the shop first opened and has given local Bay Artists the chance to build their dreams.

• Vyne Bystro – 110 Paseo de San Antonio Walk map

  

  

  Paintings by Ché and Tom Dytko

  A contemporary body of work from two south bay artist will be at display in the Vyne. The works explore both social and psychological issues, the beauty and the darkness of art. Two opposite pols will bring a unique aesthetic experience to the space.

CONTINUED EXHIBITS…

• Anno Domini // the second coming of Art & Design – 366 South First St. map

  
  Artwork by Bohdan Burenko (Ukraine)

  On View in galleryONE: Graffuturism 6 year Anniversary Group Exhibit

  Anno Domini Gallery will celebrate Graffuturism’s 6 Year Anniversary with an international exhibition opening First Friday May 6, 2016. Graffuturism has exhibited as a group over the past 6 years in cities such as Glasgow, London, Los Angeles, Paris, Miami and San Francisco. Graffuturism has chosen Anno Domini Gallery to hold an anniversary show bringing together an impressive group of International artists to exhibit. Poesia has curated a lineup of premier Urban/Graffiti Art artist who have been pivotal in the development of Graffuturism including members of the group as well as those closely associated with them. This exhibition casts a view that includes a wide range of aesthetics that exemplify the essence of this “Othercontemporary” movement known as Graffuturism, and also to explore where this movement is heading.

  
  Various & Gould, “Pick A Poison”, screenprint, collage and acrylic on wood, 29.5 x 20.50 inches, Berlin 2016

  On View in galleryTWO: “Permanently Improvised” new works by street art duo Various & Gould (Berlin, Germany).

  Dada turns 100 – long live the nonsense! Infected with these high-spirits, Berlin based artist duo Various & Gould has locked itself in the laboratory for several months creating new, surreal artworks for their first solo exhibition “Permanently Improvised” at Anno Domini Gallery in San Jose.

  Berlin based artist duo Various & Gould have worked in close collaboration since 2005. The artists often deal with socially prominent themes such as work, migration, gender, death,religion or the financial crisis in a playful, intuitive manner. Vivid colors combined with typography and encrypted messages are the characteristics of their work. Various & Gould are known for constantly reinventing themselves. Their creation is based on the simple but striking formula: 1+1=3. Interests such as the love for paper, the enthusiasm for accidental beauty in everyday life and especially the artistic work in public spaces form the basis for their teamwork. Screen-prints and collages are their great passion.

  Suitably, the title “Permanently Improvised” is a tribute to the DIY culture, and a reference to everlasting workarounds, precarious existences and a fundamental attitude towards life.

• Higher Fire Clayspace & Gallery – 499 South Market St. map

  TBA

• KALEID gallery – 88 South Fourth St. map

  Closed this evening due to SubZERO Festival.

• Downtown Yoga Shala – 450 South First St. map

  TBA

• Phantom Galleries at Pho69 – 321 South First St. map

  
  

  Photography by Diane Kreiter

  Diane Kreiter is a Fine-Art photographer living in Santa Clara, working primarily with small-format (35mm), black & white film, making unique toned silver gelatin photographs. This current exhibit presents examples from an expanding body of work that concentrates on industrial interiors, exteriors, remnants and machinery found at working and abandoned factories, both in Silicon Valley and Louisiana and Georgia. While scouring various industrial environments for potential images, Diane is drawn mostly to the more intimate interiors, and especially the mechanical relics, which eventually result in a photographic still-life that speaks to the surprising beauty found in our rapidly fading industrial landscape.

• Psycho Donuts – 288 South Second St. map

  
  

  Spring Refresher. A continuation of current show featuring works by David Mejia, John Hageman, Kimi Star, Don Bon, Dylan Kelly, Jared Konopitski, Julie Meridian, Nicolas Caesar, Kori Thompson and Veronica Casson

• SoFA Market – 387 South First St. map

  
  

  “iBecome” by Andre Hart
  A series of paintings on display at SoFA Market.

• Third Space Fitness – 550 South first St. map

  

  “Kenneth + Crescenciana Ronquillo” by The Lola x Kenneth Collaboration

  My name is Kenneth and my grandma (lola in Tagalog) is Crescenciana, and together we’re the Lola x Kenneth Collaboration. Before Lola turned 94, I moved home to help care for her. I wanted to find a way to make the most of our time together so I thought, “Hey, why don’t we make some cool stuff? Why don’t we make some art?” My grandma makes the paintings. I promise to finish everything she starts.

  

  “The Dynamic Sea” by Patrick Bremser

  From Patrick Bremser: I am the result of a long line of artisans and teachers. I am a waterman, a chef, a lover of life and puzzles, a spirit walker and a creative. Between the folds of Light and Dark, Magic plays. Through my photography, I search to find those moments filled with magic to share with you. I will be showing 2 styles of images: slow shutter ocean photography titled, “The Dynamic Sea” and a few local landscapes.

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  South FIRST FRIDAYS presents
  9th Annual SubZERO Festival June 3rd & 4th
  6pm–midnight in the SoFA District

  Focused on emerging and present subcultures thriving in our region, SubZERO is a DIY, artistically bent, hi/lo-techno mashup where street meets geek. Now two days! Come out either night (or both!) and enjoy open galleries, 100+ artists, performers, indie businesses and live bands celebrating the creative spirit!

  Thank you to our Sponsors & Partners that help make the 9th Annual SubZERO Festival possible!
  Knight Foundation, Lagunitas Brewing Co., City of San Jose’s Office of Cultural Affairs, San Jose Downtown Association, The Continental, SoFA Market, Cafe Stritch, and Techshop.

  SubZERO Festival is produced by Two Fish Design and powered by local artists, musicians and indie-creatives.